Sexual morality, evolution, and religion

Sexual morality is pervasive. Little is known about why norms surrounding sexual behaviors exist, and which individual differences drive variation in moral judgments of sex. This dissertation combined two models purporting to explain variation in religiosity to understand variation in moral judgments of sexual behaviors more broadly: the reproductive religiosity model and the idea that religions enhance within-group cooperation. The reproductive religiosity model posits that interest in long-term mating with high levels of reproduction leads to perceptions of sexual behaviors such as promiscuity, homosexuality, or abortion as morally wrong, as the behaviors are associated with promiscuity. Cooperating to moralize sexual behaviors may ensure paternity certainty, or signal an individual’s cooperative capacity. The dissertation examined if an interaction between reproductive and cooperative concerns amplified moral judgments toward 15 sexual behaviors for individuals (N = 1,057; 474 men; 574 women; 9 participants identifying as “other”); how religious individuals (n = 534; 250 men, 280 women; 4 participants identifying as “other”) differed from non-religious individuals (n = 523; 224 men, 294 women; 5 participants identifying as “other”) in their moralization of sex; and which aspects of religion most influenced moral judgments toward sexual behaviors for religious participants. Exploratory analyses examined how perceptions of disease vulnerability, broader conceptualizations of morality, and conservatism were associated with moral judgments of sexual behaviors, if there was a link between religious affiliation, reproductive, and cooperative concerns, and how religious affiliation differed by age and sexual orientation. The study replicated previous research showing that greater reproductive concerns, religiosity, moral concerns, and conservatism were related to harsher moral judgments of sexual behavior. Results suggest that reproductive—but not cooperative—concerns are important for moral judgments toward only two sexual behaviors, but that variation in religious components, moral foundations, or conservatism explains variation for moral judgements of sex more broadly. Future research may consider expanding the current methodology to examine which sexual behaviors are associated with perceptions of cheating, how other emotions impact moral judgments of sex, how perceptions of harm vary according to the actor engaging in sexual acts, and how non- Western religions influence perceptions of sex.Psycholog